The James Irvine Foundation launched the Communities Organizing Resources to Advance Learning (CORAL) initiative in 1999 with the goal of improving the academic achievement of children in the lowest-performing schools in five California cities. In 2004, CORAL adopted a more targeted approach toward reaching this goal by integrating a regular schedule of literacy instruction into its after-school programs. This interim report, based on research conducted between Fall 2004 and Summer 2005, documents CORAL's progress toward implementing high-quality and consistent literacy programming. The report presents early results in terms of youth's positive reading gains and describes the program components that appear to have contributed to these gains. It also identifies challenges CORAL sites faced and successful strategies for addressing those challenges. (Three appendices are included: (1) Methodology and Data Collection; (2) Data Analysis for Chapter III; and (3) CORAL City Operating Organizations. Conant's 45 endnotes and 18 tables.)